Pokemon: Radical Redux

New cover and I updated the Pokemon.

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"So, that's pretty much all I know," Ash said. He expanded on a few things but left others out, like how he gave Lance the Aerodactyl or the stuff about Ho-Oh, only mentioning that he got the ring and doesn't really know much about it.

"Huh… so Lance gave you the Egg as a prize for winning the League, and you just… found the ring when we separated right before the S.S. Anne?" Brock asked as if needing more clarification.

"Yep. I don't really know much else. I wish I could tell you more, but I genuinely don't know what this ring does. As far as I know, one time I accidentally touched a Sun Stone to it, and then it just… absorbed it, I guess? Then it started working," Ash explained.

"That sounds completely made up," Misty said. She paused for a moment, thought it over, and sighed. "But then again, it isn't even the weirdest thing we've seen, so it's not that hard to believe."

"So, you can just put things in that ring?" Yellow asked.

"Oh no, not at all. As far as I've seen, it only works with evolution stones. I even tried with my Keystone, but it didn't work," Ash said, emphasizing his point by grabbing a spoon and tapping it against the ring.

"Huh… and you can't take it off?" Delia asked as she set another plate of pancakes on the table.

Ash held out his hand. "You can try, but I haven't been able to take this thing off. I've had it on for like a year. By all means, go ahead and try."

Misty took the challenge, grabbing Ash's hand and pulling as hard as she could. "Why won't this thing come off?!"

Ash just sat there, taking a bite of his pancakes with his free hand. "See? Can you stop pulling my finger now? It doesn't hurt, but I'm starting to think you're just trying to find an excuse to hold my hand~."

Misty sputtered, "W-wha?! No way! Who'd want to hold your hand, you idiot?"

Molly raised her hand. "I would."

"Fufufu, of course, I'd love to hold Ash's hand," Delia said, laughing.

"You two don't count!" Misty snapped as she slipped and fell to the floor. Grumbling, she let Ash reluctantly help her up.

Molly squinted her eyes. "You know, you act differently around my big brother. May I ask what your relationship with him is?"

Ash burst out laughing, while Misty blushed. "What? What does that have to do with anything?"

Ash was slamming his fist on the table, dying of laughter in the background, while Molly stared at Misty. "You know, I just got my brother, and I won't let anyone steal him."

Then she pointed a small finger at Yellow, who was eating peacefully, and continued, "And the same goes for you! You're way more of a threat when it comes to taking away my big brother!"

Yellow stammered, blushing a deep red. "W-w-w-what? N-no!"

"We're just friends, Molly! No one is crushing on your brother!" Misty yelled.

Ash laughed even harder, falling off his chair and rolling on the floor. "She—haha—didn't say anything about crushes! Something you wanna say, hahaha?"

As Delia giggled at the scene, she thought about teasing them but remembered Ash had already made it clear: he wouldn't date anyone until he was at least 16, which was probably for the best.

Molly huffed and pouted, pointing to her tiny hands. "And you better keep it that way! My big brother is only for me!"

Once everything finally calmed down, Ash forced himself to stand, still crying from laughing so much. "Oh, that was a good laugh. Man, I never thought I'd say this, but now I wish Pink was here so I could hear what you'd say."

"Who's Pink?" Molly asked. She had been to Pallet Town before and knew Green and Gary, but other than that, she didn't know anyone else from there.

"Oh, I have a feeling you'll figure it out soon enough," Ash said as he got up. "Anyway, Mom, you mind if I let Charizard out in the living room so Kadabra can send him back to Charicific Valley?"

"Oh, Charicific Valley? Your father took me there once—those were good times. Sure, go ahead, just don't burn anything," Delia said casually, as though she didn't just drop some surprising mom lore. But Ash didn't say anything.

Ash nodded and threw out two Poké Balls, releasing Charizard and Kadabra. Charizard was still half-asleep and recovering but looked much better. Ash walked up to him, gently rubbing his head. "Thanks for everything, bud. I couldn't have done it without you."

Charizard nuzzled into Ash's touch. "Charizard… [Any time…]"

Ash then turned to Kadabra. "Kadabra, can you send Charizard back to the Valley?"

But Kadabra crossed her arms. "Kadabra!"

Ash's eye twitched. "What do you mean that's not your name? You evolved, you're not an Abra anymore!"

"Kad-abra!" Kadabra said stubbornly. This whole exchange was a bit ridiculous, considering only Ash and Yellow could actually understand Kadabra.

Ash groaned and took a deep breath. "Okay, first, stop talking like that talk normally," he said. "And second, if you want to be called something else, then just tell me."

"Kadabra!" she said again, this time pointing at Delia.

"Me?" Delia asked, tilting her head. "I don't think you can use my name… unless you mean you want me to give you a name?"

Ash squinted, tilting his head in thought. "Wait… you want to use the one she gave you before? What was it? Abby, I think?"

Kadabra nodded excitedly. "Kadabra!"

Delia clapped her hands, beaming. "Oh, you'll actually use the cute nickname I suggested! I'm so happy~!"

Ash sighed, rubbing his face. "Fine… Abby. Can you please take Charizard back to the Valley now?"

Abby, as she now wanted to be called, saluted and teleported away with Charizard. Ash mumbled under his breath, "Well, that isn't going to be annoying at all…"

After she left, Ash sighed and looked at everyone. "I'm heading over to the Professor's. I want to ask for my Onix back. I'll be gone for, like, ten minutes. See ya then," he said, slipping on his boots and walking out of the house to retrieve his Pokémon.

—--

{Back with Ashtwo}

The bus parked next to a large tree, arriving at what appeared to be a small lab. The team assigned to enter consisted of ten members, not including Proton: Proton himself, D., Enid, Jay, Helena, Domino, and five random grunts.

As they disembarked, there was one extra member— the driver. He wore a brown Team Rocket uniform that looked like he had modified it, leaving it open in the front. Muscular, with blond hair and sunglasses, he was known as Attila.

Ash recognized him as one of the antagonists in The Legend of Thunder! Movie, paired with his partner, Hun. However, Attila was alone, probably sent by the boss. Being a weapons expert, and he had a bazooka slung across his back clearly signaled that stealth was optional.

Proton stepped forward, surveying the group. Both D. and Attila were high-ranking commanders, while Enid, Jay, and Domino were high-ranking grunts. Helena and the five remaining members were regular grunts.

"Everyone knows the rules," Proton began. "We go in and out quickly. If we do this right, it'll be smooth and clean. Commander D., your report says you're good with computers, is that correct?"

"Yes," Ash replied in a bored, uninterested tone. "Just tell me what you need."

"Good. You'll come in handy. Commander Attila," Proton turned, "care to explain why you're here?"

"Yep, listen up," Attila said, grinning. "I'm the weapons and demolition expert. Recently, we found a place similar to this, but it was barricaded. A few sticks of dynamite solved that. So, try not to get in my way unless you want shrapnel in your head," he added with a laugh.

Proton nodded. "Understood. Any questions?"

Most of the group assumed this was another situation where questions wouldn't be answered, as Archer often did. But Domino, ever hopeful, raised her hand.

"So… we'll be really close to each other, right?" she asked, practically glowing with excitement.

Surprisingly, Proton answered. "Yes. We'll have to stick together. We don't know what we'll find, though we have some ideas. Unless I say otherwise, we stay close, and you will all follow my lead. Now, if there are no further questions, we're going in."

The team exchanged glances and sighed. They had wasted their one opportunity to ask something useful. Meanwhile, Domino was fangirling over the fact that Proton had actually spoken to her, requiring Jay and Helena to drag her along.

Proton led the group toward the lab's entrance, with D. and Attila close behind. When they reached the door, Attila stepped forward, placing a hand on it. "Looks like this place had automatic doors, but they're not opening. Too rusted," he observed.

Smiling, Attila dug into his bag and pulled out some thermite. "Well then, time for some fun!"

He carefully applied the thermite to the rusted hinges and lit it. A bright light flared up, accompanied by a shower of sparks, as the hinges began to melt.

When the sparks finally died down, Attila looked back at D. and Proton. "Don't suppose you've got a way to pry this open? If not, we're looking at about thirty minutes for it to cool down."

As he spoke, Attila pulled out some tools to begin prying the door apart just enough to prevent the metal from fusing together permanently.

"No need, I'll take it from here," Ash said as he raised his hand. Purple sludge began oozing out from his sleeve, it was Muk as it formed something that kinda looked like a purple arm that shot tentacles to the door.

It surrounded his arm, then shot forward, gripping the door's edges. The sludge bubbled and hissed as it pried the doors apart. Once the path was cleared, the slime retreated back into Ash's sleeve. He adjusted his glove casually. "Let's go."

Needless to say, everyone was stunned. Only Enid and Jay had an idea of what they'd just seen. Attila, however, smiled and said, "Not bad, kid. What was that, if you don't mind sharing?"

Ash shrugged. "I have a Muk. I trained him to get rid of his stench, and I keep him with me to deal with these kinds of problems," he replied, ignoring the stares directed at him.

Attila laughed. "Now that's creative. I guess you're a commander for a reason!"

As the rest of the team tried to process what just happened, Proton stepped forward. Without a word, he threw a PokéBall, releasing an Electrode. The Pokémon used [Flash], lighting up the lab.

The lab was in complete disarray, with papers strewn everywhere and scratch marks on the walls. At the far end of the room stood a dormant computer, its screen black.

Proton glanced at Ash. "Think you can do something with that?"

Ash took a quick look. "I can, but I need a power source." He looked at Electrode, then back at Proton. "Do you mind?"

Proton nodded, and Electrode rolled over to Ash. Ash pulled up a chair and let Meowth leap onto his shoulder. She jumped to the back of the computer, grabbed some wires, and handed them to Electrode. The Pokémon bit down on the wires, sending a steady current to power the computer.

The computer roared to life. Ash pulled out his phone and placed it next to the screen, allowing Porygon-Z to enter. The first obstacle was a password-protected system, but Porygon fixed that pretty easily, then as he quickly looked over he saw there was an option to get power back on.

"Looks like I can get this thing running," Ash mumbled, typing furiously as Porygon-Z hacked into the system. Within moments, he bypassed the password, activated the backup generator, and brought the lab's full power online.

The lights flickered to life across the room.

"Not bad," Proton remarked, leaning over D's shoulder. "How long do you think it'll take to access everything?"

"Give me five minutes," Ash said calmly.

Proton nodded and turned to the rest of the team. "You heard him. Start searching. D. was kind enough to turn on the lights, so put them to use. Look for anything—papers, clues, even a crumb. Move it!"

The team snapped into action, spreading out to scour the lab.

Meanwhile, in the group of five, Domino leaned closer to Jay and Enid. "Huh. Not bad. I see why the Boss took a liking to him. He really is good."

"Yeah, D. is the coolest," Jay said with a nod. "He can do all sorts of things with computers. One time, he hacked an entire base and stole the information so we could retrieve it for the Boss. He did it all by himself."

"Really?" Helena asked, glancing over at Ash as he worked intently at the computer. "Is there anything else?"

"Well, besides being overly cocky…" Enid began.

"Don't even start," Jay interrupted. "D. is a nice guy. He doesn't rub it in our faces or act smug about it. Also, shouldn't you be wondering how you're going to apologize to him?"

"Never. I'll never apologize to anyone," Enid said with a scowl. "Besides, it's not my fault."

"No, it literally is all your fault," Domino said bluntly.

Helena nodded in agreement. "Yeah, it really is. If you just apologized, things could be so much easier."

Enid opened her mouth to argue, but Ash's voice cut through the conversation. "Hey, everyone. I found something..."

The room went quiet as everyone stopped what they were doing. Proton and Attila walked up behind Ash, peering over his shoulders at the screen.

Ash pointed at the monitor displaying the lab's energy usage. "I checked, and there wasn't much here at first, but then I found this. Apparently, only 10% of the current power is being directed to this part of the lab. That means something else is using the other 90%."

"Interesting…" Proton muttered. "Can you figure out what it's powering?"

"Not from here," Ash replied. "But there's a command attached to the admin controls. Permission to activate it?"

Proton nodded. "Granted."

Ash typed a series of commands as Porygon-Z infiltrated deeper into the system. Suddenly, a mechanical sound echoed from the side of the room where some of the nameless grunts were searching. A secret wall slid open, revealing a staircase blocked by a massive stone slab.

Attila walked over to inspect it, placing his hand on the stone. "Looks like someone went through the trouble of sealing this off. Which means... it's my time to shine."

He grinned as he pulled out a stick of dynamite from his bag. "Everyone, step back!"

The team quickly moved to safety, ducking behind desks or finding cover. Attila placed the dynamite at the base of the stone, lit the fuse, and then flipped over a desk to shield himself from the blast.

The explosion shook the room, and bits of debris rained down as the stone was obliterated. Smoke filled the air as everyone waited for it to clear.

Once the dust settled, Attila was the first to step forward, peering down into the revealed passageway. "Hey, look at that. This place goes way down."

Proton waved his hand in front of his face, trying to clear the lingering smoke as he approached the opening. Ash and the other grunts followed closely behind, and they could see the top of a staircase spiraling into a secret underground extension of the lab.

"Very well," Proton said, his tone sharp and commanding. "We'll be going deeper. Looks like this might not be as simple as we thought."

He whistled sharply, and Electrode rolled forward, its glowing body lighting the path down the staircase.

Proton took the lead, descending into the depths of the lab, with Ash, Attila, and the rest of the team following closely behind.