DIN-01 Blue's Story

As Titania climbed her way to the top the air grew thin and the temperatures colder. Non-ice pokemon grew more scarce as they shied away from the unideal temperatures. The snow muffled all sound, resulting in a deathly silence save for the ocassional distant attack being launched. Even then, the snow had a squelching effect.

Then, the caves gave way to to the peak-- A steep climb up a snowy slope of reasonabl distance was the only thing between Titania and being the first up the mountain. That, and there was already someone there. A female with skin tinted grey and bearing a metallic texture on closer inspection stood on the very top of the mountain, a mild layer of snow already having gathered where possible on her body. She was facing away from Titania, looking down over the mountain as if in deep thought.

...Was she... frozen? Had she made it to the top, only to finally embrace that she could not stand the cold long enough to get back down and spent her last moments reflecting over the view?

Only one way to find out.

Titania Brightsmith couldn't believe it. Either she was hallucinating from the snow, or there was someone waiting at the top of the mountain! This proximity gave her the strength to make the final ascent. Three steps, two, one...not even ice-types dared go this far up. Not so much for the temperature. More for the screeching winds.

"Haa...haaa...I did it...I actually did it...but it seems I was not the first." The grey-skinned girl seemed to have beaten her there, but it clearly wasn't Iris. As Titania's shaking hands set up the camera to record her conquest with a single snapshot, curiosity got the better of her, and she dropped her pack to tap the female on the shoulder. You know, to get a good shot before she had to make her way down.

The young lady was deathly still, her short skirt swaying in the wind. As Titania touched her shoulder she'd find it was covered in snow. One might have immediately assumed that she was frozen standing up, and quite dead. However, they'd be wrong. When touched she promptly turned and reached out without warning, grabbing Titania by the cloth covering her torso and pulling her with inhuman strength in such a manner as to bend her down so that they could see eye to eye, faces mere inches apart.

The girl's eyes were wide, and glowed brightly in the dim lighting. Her hands were as cold as the snow itself. The girl stared into Titania's eyes, as if attempting to see into her soul, not making any move to release or further manhandle her. Though, if Titania attempted to free herself she'd find that the young lady's arms were as tough as steel.

Titania Brightsmith couldn't believe what she was seeing. The legends were true--the girl was a spitting image of the one only known as Blue, save for the obvious robotic elements. "Hey, at least buy me dinner first," she snapped, mildly offended at the sudden movement before using a martial arts move to break free.

Maybe the hell she lived through on Terra wasn't totally without its downsides after all.

"What? You want to battle me or something?" She snapped the picture, getting herself and the other girl in the shot. "I'm sorry, but I don't have time to play with you."

But a robotic replica of Blue! Iris would totally want to make it up here if she knew! "I'm not getting out of here without a fight, am I?" she mused out loud, all too familiar with the eye-to-eye challenge as she dropped into a ready stance.

The champion and the legend. This would be decided here and now!

The skirted figure's expression remained rather unreadable as the other struck at her to free herself. Though Titania was strong, DIN-01 was stronger than any human. Thus, when she was struck her grip remained strong, tearing open part of Titania's jacket. This actually seemed to surprise the shorter robot girl slightly, and she stared at the cloth in her hand as if it were a foreign object before releasing her grip on it and letting it fall.

Without a single word she turned her attention back to Titania and a smile formed across her face over the course of three seconds.

"..."

She nodded her head slowly in response. It was time to battle. Reaching down she pulled out a single pokeball and held it up, releasing exactly one pikachu. The pikachu seemed perfectly normal as far as pikachus went unlike her trainer.

Titania Brightsmith smiled. Pikachu, eh? "Time to rumble! Let's get it, Claw!" she shouted, releasing her Excadrill who promptly started complaining about the cold before seeing the Pikachu. "Well, then, let's make this quick," he growled, clashing his namesake against each other.

"Claw, use Swords Dance!" Pikachu had nothing that could meaningfully do damage, after all. The sounds of the erupting battle would quickly draw the attention of Iris, Tinora and Matt.

As Titania's excadrill received it's commands DIN-01's pikachu abruptly launched forward at high speeds as if to strike Claw dead on. However it abruptly stopped at the last moment as if completely abandoning the attack before abruptly sprinting in and smacking excadrill across the face with it's tail. The attack itself was not impressive, but the mind games associated with it were very advanced.

DIN-01 had not said anything. How had she given commands? Did her pokemon just... /know/ what to do? Needless to say, her pikachu had taken priority and screwed with Claw's ability to pull off a sword's dance. Landing not far away, DIN-01's pikachu began to violently shake in a hyper-energized manner as it used agility, the snow literally melting slightly beneath it as it's body generated heat from sheer excess energy flowing off of it. Meanwhile, DIN-01 looked on with a stoic expression on her face.

"Gah!" Claw shook his head and backed off, seeing stars for a moment but soon regaining his composure. "Okay, Claw, let's try that again! Swords Dance!" She wouldn't let this girl learn any more info than necessary, instead taking advantage of the lack of damage options Pikachu possessed to set up for some major pain down the road even as hail damage made its presence known.

Steel claws clanged against each other, sharply raising Excadrill's Attack and getting the attention of everyone within earshot. Forget how she was giving commands. Focus on the battle, woman.

Little did Titania expect what came next. DIN-01's pikachu shot forward at intense speeds, her tail glowing with powerful energy. Was that... iron tail perhaps? Absolutely not. It was brick break. No damaging options indeed, Titania. This was not an attack her excadrill would enjoy taking once, let alone twice with it's steel typing. The pikachu aim for the knees on it's initial strike, before literally bouncing high into the air and coming down for a second strike, all utilizing it's enhanced speed. In truth, she intended to land on Claw's head. This was in anticipation of an earthquake attack. One would have an extremely difficult time hitting her with an earthquake attack while she was perched on top of it's user.

Titania and Claw both grimaced at the initial leg sweep before Pikachu bounced up to finish it with a second strike. "Claw! Up high!" Titania shouted. "X-Scissor!" Sure he could take the one hit, maybe not two. Still, she had just learned some valuable information--Pikachu did in fact have a move that could pose troublesome, so it needed to go down now.

As for Claw's part, the Excadrill rose his head and put his claws together to form the drill configuration for which it was partly named, forming a point to deflect the trajectory of the incoming blow before retaliating with a wicked double slash, crossing his blades to catch the poor airborne Pikachu in the middle of its follow-up attack.

Iris hesitated a moment before lightly tapping her lapras' shell with her heels. "Looks like we're speeding up to keep up with mister eager over here~" she remarked in a semi-disappointed, semi-amused tone. Lapras began to float along, a very smooth ride compared to say haxorus.


Meanwhile, DIN-01's pikachu was sent reeling back where it collapsed, unable to get back up. DIN-01 responded by sending out a charizard, which promtply stomped one foot against the snow and began to harshly beat it's stomach in a self-destructive manner. Rather than fainting however, it became enraged and began glowing with an awesome power. Say hello to belly drum.

Tinora;holding her sleeping Raichu in her arms while petting him

Matt;telling Blastoise to slow down so the girls will catch up

Titania Brightsmith grimaced. A Charizard at half health? Too easy. "Claw! Use Rock Slide!" As there were no rocks above to speak of, the Excadrill had to make do with rubble from below being pulled up and hurled at the target instead of simply dropped from above. So as not to endanger either Trainer, the reverse avalanche came in from Charizard's right side and swept across Blue's half of the battlefield.

"For a legendary Trainer, I thought you'd put up more of a fight than this," Titania mumbled to herself as the cold started penetrating her ripped jacket.

Unfortunately for Titania, DIN-01 was not the only one whom had seemingly made a mistake. That mistake was trusting Rock Slide to hit, especially after she had had to improvise the rocks location. Charizard abruptly launched itself into the air, doing a spin and stretching it's wings out at the peak of it's height before emitting a powerful roar. As Charizard did this flames spewed from her mouth, littering the immediate area and flash-melting some of the snow on contact. Charizard itself was coated in the flames, and abruptly dive bombed Claw from above with intent to slam into the drill pokemon. It was flare blitz. After a belly drum, it probably hadn't mattered what she'd chosen to use.


Meanwhile, Iris yawned, apparently bored. "Don't worry... We're not going to let him leave us in the dust. Right Lapras?~" she asked in a slightly cheery tone, still peering over Tinora's shoulder. "I think I hear a battle up ahead." she remarked idly, predicting trouble.

Tinora;also hearing that battle as she still held her Raichu since she won't wake him she returned him to his pokeball

Titania Brightsmith slipped a little bit as the tremendous heat of the collision washed over her. Claw couldn't do much about the impact except curse the Charizard in Poké-speak before the safety mechanism automatically recalled him to the shelter of his Poké Ball.

Titania took a moment to consider her options. The Charizard before her was fast and powerful. Fast enough to outrun most of her remaining friends, and powerful enough to take them all down in one hit. Between Flare Blitz recoil and ongoing damage from the environment, it would eventually fall, but there was a better way. One that would keep her from having to fight her way out of a massive hole. "It's time, my old friend. Go, Ulysses! Finish it with Aqua Jet!"

A proud and majestic Empoleon didn't even seem to fully materialize before shooting a powerful jet of water behind him, which immediately froze but served to rocket him forward and into his opponent.

There was a story going around Pastoria City in the Sinnoh region about how a challenger to that Gym used a combination of an ice attack and Aqua Jet to form his Buizel into a massive spear of ice to impale Wake's Floatzel and win the match. What happened here was kind of like that.

Iris shifted her weight to one side and wedged her hands underneath Tinora, sliding off lapras' back and holding the smaller girl in her arms. She then proceeded to return lapras to it's pokeball. "We don't want to provoke whatever's making that noise." she warned. And in all fairness, it made sense. A pokemon wasn't likely to be threatened by a human's presence alone. They'd need /ulterior/ motives to attack them then.

Without further ado, she set Tinora back on her feet and moved to catch up with Matt manually.

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Meanwhile on the top of the mountain, DIN-01 watched as Titania used an empoleon and... flash freezed an aqua jet like a projectile. The icy barrage slammed into Charizard, and Charizard seemed to catch it. She slid back several feet through the snow with a laboured groan before... stopping.

Charizard wasn't finished off at /all/.

The flame lizard pseudo dragon glared at Titania's empoleon for a moment before lifting a foot and bringing it down hard on the ground, simultaneously smashing the icey missile against the ground and causing a powerful shockwave to rock through the snow, ice, and rock. The very mountain rocked back and fourth for a moment and shockwave arc'd up to cause the ground to explode under Ulysses.

It also caused an avalanche. The ground shifted, quickly gathering momentum as it traveled further down the mountain. Titania and DIN-01 were so close that they likely merely get thrown off their feet. Charizard wobbled and panicked a bit as the snow shifted under her, taking to the air. Meanwhile, DIN-01 struggled to get back to her feet.

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Meanwhile, a much more serious avalanche headed directly towards Matt, Tinora, and Iris. Iris just sort of felt the rumbling before it was even visible, managing to stay standing only by the miracle of her athletically inclined body. Looking up, she saw a wall of white coming straight at them and just sort of gawked for a brief moment.

Crud

Tinora;looking around and seeing that wall and Blastoise standing infront ready to catch the wall as Matt climbed down not wanting to get hurt

Titania yelped in surprise as the entire mountain shook, sending a wave of snow crashing down the side and Ulysses crashing to the ground, gasping for breath at the high altitude before retreating to his Poké Ball. Suddenly, a gust hit her right in the rip of her jacket, and the message was clear. It's not that she didn't stack up to the legend. It's that she couldn't beat an android with a processor many times faster than any human brain. No matter how Titania tried to wriggle out of this, she'd have to come from behind, and the longer she stayed up here the more likely it was that she would die from exposure. There was only one rational choice. Kanto and Johto needed their champion. Besides, what would the League think if they heard that the regional championship now belonged to a fake?

"Fuck it. I give up. Bomber, fly me out of here." While she couldn't have flown to the top from the bottom, going down was another story altogether. A Skarmory was released, but instead of facing the Charizard, it instead flew up and whisked its Trainer to the safety of her home. On the way, she had some choice words for her friends.

"Iris! The legend is real! Get down while you still can!"

DIN-01 just sort of... stared at Titania as she left, silently. She was silently judging the other female. Judging.... In all seriousness though, it was incredibly difficult to read her expression, and she did not give chase.

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Iris just sort of stopped and gave Titania a confused expression. Really? Legend? The older female was scared of something? Well sheesh! Iris gawked a bit, but didn't have enough time to respond, heavily distracted with something... slightly more pressing.

What was Matt doing standing there in front of that avalanche..? He...--he wasn't really going to try and stop that with his face, right..?

A wall of non-solid snow simply slammed into Matt, burrying him. This caused Iris to tense as a feeling of dread came over her. W-Why would Matt sit there in front of an Avalanche?! This was baffling to her... baffling enough that she tried to rush out and save him from possible death instead of trying to protect herself. At the last moment she realized that this was a childishly hopeless effort and attempted to shield herself from the imminent impact... only to be partially protected via standing in Matt's Blastoise' shadow. Even still, the snow ripped her off her feet and sent her flying back in a chaotic manner.

Every once in a while she regretted getting up in the morning.