Stars twinkle in the sky as Lazarus and his pokemon sleep peacefully inside their tent. That peace is destroyed, when an alarm goes off inside the tent, something or someone is intruding into their camp.
Lazarus wakes himself from sleep as fast as he can. The pokemon are also awake.
He grabs a flashlight and pulls out his stun gun, flashlight in his left hand, the gun on his right one, he turns his pokemon and says, "Don't do anything without me saying. I don't want you guys to panic and attack each other by mistake. Eidolon, perform a psychic sweep and tell me how many pokemon there are."
Eidolon nods, and flares his psionic energy outwards. Beyond the mental signature inside the tent, he sense three more outside, not far away from the tent. He lets Lazarus know.
"Three? You sure?" Lazarus asks. If the pokemon outside happens to be overly hostile to them, then they are going to be in some trouble.
Eidolon nods.
"Okay. We leave the tent one by one. Kamish, you go first and then wait above the tent, be prepared to attack. Then Eidolon and me will go out, followed by Sol. Aurora, you should stay inside for now."
Aurora barks at him, refusing to stay inside. She won't let them fight whatever is out there alone.
"It's okay, Aurora. We got this, you stay inside for now. If the situation devolves into a fight then you can come out. Is that okay with you?"
Aurora nods, reluctantly agreeing to this arrangement.
"Alright then, Kamish, go."
Kamish phrases through the tent as Lazarus opens its zipper.
Eidolon and Lazarus exit the tent next.
"Where are they?" Lazarus asks, crouching next to the cruiser.
Eidolon points towards the intruding pokemon's direction.
Lazarus gives the area a sweep with his flashlight, but doesn't see anything.
He signals Eidolon to approach, and instructs Sol to prepare a flamethrower.
They both do as told. Eidolon approaches the intruders with Lazarus and Sol following behind.
Lazarus clenches the stun gun in his hands, prepared to shoot the moment the pokemon is in view.
He hears movement in the front and something comes in front of his flashlight.
Lazarus sees three pokemon resembling a root vegetable, they are blue with a bulb like figure with leaves on their head. Two of them are fully grown while one is still growing.
All his pokemon ask confirmation to attack.
"No. Don't attack." Lazarus says as he breathes a sigh of relief, "Ignore them. They won't be a problem."
Eidolon asks, Why?
"Oddish are a harmless pokemon species. They never attack anyone, even when provoked. They are of no threat to us, so we'll let them go. And I don't feel like attacking an innocent pokemon family when they are just trying to live their life in peace."
And with that, they return back to their tent and the rest of the night goes peacefully without any other incident.
---
They wake up early morning. This is their second day in the Horshoe Plains. The weather is nice, there is a gentle breeze which brings with it the faint smell of nectar and honey. The aroma from the meadows.
Lazarus and his pokemon are having breakfast. Lazarus heated up some of the nutrient packs, Blueberry oats with milk for him, rice with meat curry for the Kamish, Aurora and Sol, mineral supplements for Eidolon.
The food isn't fresh so it doesn't taste as good as the food they have at home, but it's still tasty.
Lazarus spoons a mouthful of oats, and says after swallowing it, "Yesterday's training session didn't go that well, I admit, but I am not going to make the same mistake again. Today we will train in peace, and it's finally time that you guys fought each other in battle. That is the fastest way for you to grow right now."
All his pokemon looks intrigued with the idea.
Kamish asks how they are going to fight. The pokemon all feel Kamish's excitement and confidence for the fights, he has total and absolute faith in his own victory.
Aurora looks at Kamish with the corner of her eyes, she doesn't think she can win against him, but he's being annoying and needs to be taught a lesson.
"Two of you will fight at a time. But to make it fair and safe, your goals isn't to win by defeating your opponent, but to showcase your ability. If you can showcase abilities and perform better tactically than your opponent, then you win. This will create a training cycle for us where, I design and formulate new abilities and techniques for you and you guys learn them while fighting against each other."
Aurora grins at Kamish, she can't beat him in a straight fight, but she might be able to best him at this.
Sol and Eidolon also feel like they can perform well in this training exercise.
Kamish mentally shrugs, it doesn't matter what the competition is. He will fight to win any and all of them.
"Alright then, who wants to go first?"
They all jump at the opportunity. Sol and Aurora raise their hand and paw respectively, Kamish wags his tail in the air, and Eidolon simply uses the psychic link to convey his intention to participate first.
Lazarus thinks about which of his two pokemon should go first, "Eidolon barely knows anything about fighting, so this will be a good opportunity for him to learn. And he fights against Kamish because they can both fly."
Eidolon and Kamish are happy to have been chosen. Aurora pouts. Sol doesn't mind who goes first as long as he gets his turn soon.
"Aurora and Sol, you fight after them."
Aurora nods, and turns to Sol. They both look at each other as flames of sibling rivalry rises within them. Both of them want to win this.
After they finish their breakfast, they get ready for the first fight of the day.
Lazarus sits on top of the hood of the cruiser with Sol sitting on his shoulders and Aurora on his lap.
A little further away from them, Kamish and Eidolon are about to fight.
"Go."
Both pokemon rush at each other after Lazarus gives the go ahead.
Kamish reaches Eidolon first and hits his metallic exoskeleton with Dragon Tail, Lazarus did say it was fine to use this move on Eidolon since Beldums have insanely good defense.
The hit sends Eidolon back a few meters in the air. Eidolon levitates a few stones which he found on the ground using his psychic sweep and hurls them at Kamish.
Kamish dodges all four of the stones thrown at him without breaking a sweat and then rushes to tackle Eidolon.
Eidolon tanks the impact and then hurls some of the stones he had been saving for this occasion at Kamish.
Kamish is barely able to react in time as the stones phase through him.
Eidolon tries to tackle Kamish with his body, but Kamish is faster and gets out of the way and hits Eidolon with another Dragon Tail.
Eidolon is knocked towards the ground and almost hits it, but he manages to levitate just in the nick of time.
Eidolon looks up and sees Kamish about to use Dragon Dash on him.
"Stop." Lazarus says, and the both of them stop fighting, "Kamish wins."
Kamish doesn't celebrate his victory, he first floats over to Eidolon and pats him with his tail, praise for fighting so well.
"You did good, Eidolon. You used levitation quite well, and it was good strategy with the stones, if Kamish couldn't phase through matter then he would have been hit for sure. Not bad for your first time."
Eidolon basks in the praise, and then asks Lazarus how he can improve more.
Lazarus smiles, "Keep practicing your levitation. Practice your aim. Try to improve the maximum amount of stones you can levitate at the same time. Lift bigger things. Do these for the next few days, after that we will focus on teaching you Light Screen. After you learn that move, you will be able to block most incoming attacks, then even Kamish will have difficulty winning against you."
Kamish also asks what he can do to improve. He doesn't want anyone to surpass his status as the strongest in the group. How else is he going to keep his status as the big brother and protector of the family?
"I want to you to learn to become invisible. It's one of the best moves you could learn right now. If no one sees you coming then they won't be able to put up a fight. I know you like fighting, but It would be irresponsible of me to not take advantage of your natural strengths and not have you end fights as soon as possible."
Kamish understands. He does love fighting but there is also something about dominating a pokemon so thoroughly that it doesn't even get to fight back that appeals to him.
"Your turn now." He says to Aurora and Sol, "After your fight, all four of you will do normal training for an hour and then cycle back to fighting followed by another hour of training. We'll stop just before sunset and then you will recover your energy."