//------------------------------// // My Destiny // Story: Equestria: A World We Must Defend // by LightOfTriumph //------------------------------// Red Ace looked at his blank flank, and he sighed. He was far from obsessed with getting his Cutie Mark, but he thought he'd have it by now. He had been doing some work around Professor Sparkle's lab, and he was loving it! He loved working with Pokemon, he met his best friend there, and he learned more about Pokemon science and care then he would ever learn anywhere else! But still... He was still in Spectrum City. Oh, he loved his hometown, but he wanted to travel. Get a Pokemon of his own. Visit new cities, meet new Pokemon. He even thought about entering the Equestrian Pokemon League Challenge, but dismissed the thought. What chance would he have? He would have to face eight of the most powerful ponies to ever pick up a PokeBall. Then he would have to face the Elite Four, and he didn't even want to think about what that would mean... No. A trainer's life was out of reach for him. Still... A colt could dream. Dreaming would have to wait however... Twilight Sparkle had called him to the lab to ask for a favor. Ace walked in to see complete blackness. Scattered candles were being used by some of the aides, the Professor was emitting a dim purple glow with her horn. Ace walked up to her and stared directly into her eyes. They stood in silence, each with an exhausted look on their face. "There's a problem with the electricity," they said in unison. "I can see that, yes," Ace said looking around him. "Well it's not an outage. I just came from my place and it's fine. Why aren't we using the Voltorb, Prof?" "We tried," said Professor Sparkle dryly. "All of their power keeps getting drained. Every time we go down to check the fuse box however, we can see it's been tampered with, but the vandal is gone. Then we get the lights back on for about ten minutes, then they go out again." "Why call me?" Ace asked. "You seem to have a way of finding creative solutions to problems," Twilight said. "I wondered if you could think of anything that we hadn't..." Ace looked around him again and smiled when he caught sight of Twilight's Pokemon. "You could always leave it like this," he joked. "Owlicious seems to be enjoying himself." "Hoothoot!" cried the Pokemon on the desk. "Owlicious is a Hoothoot, idiot!" came a voice from the darkness. "Of course he likes the dark!" Down the stairs came Crystal Ball. Crystal was a filly around Ace's age, and his best friend. She had a deep blue coat and a long purple mane and tail. She had piercing eyes that looked like she could see right through you. She had gotten her Cutie Mark less than a month ago. It was a purple sphere with an eye in the center of it. She had an almost Psychic ability to understand the needs of Pokemon. She could almost speak to them. She learned this when she met her first Pokemon. She had protected a lost Abra from some poachers. Two freaks who wore shirts that had black C's on the chests. These guys were kidnapping wild and owned Pokemon alike. Using some quick thinking she was able to side-tackle the two and get away with the lost Pokemon. The Abra followed her home, and her parents let her keep it. Her Abra (which she named TeeKay) was following her down the stairs. "Abra...," it said scornfully. "Hi Crystal," said Ace dryly. "Any chance of you cutting me a break tonight?" "Not on your life!" Krystal laughed. "Listen, Ace. You better think of something. Because quite frankly I'm out of ideas...," "You're out of ideas?" Ace laughed. "Prof? Can I get a recorder, so I can play that back to myself on a constant loop?" "Now now...," Twilight scorned. "Oh, will you just think of something?!" Crystal pouted. "I already have," Ace laughed. He turned and called out to the rest of the lab. "Okay, does anypony have an Electric type with some juice left? Anything at all will do. I just need to time something..." One of the aides cautiously raised his hand. There was a flash and a Joltik walked up to the Professor and her two young students. Ae was suddenly worried. He didn't want to hurt the cute little thing. "Hey Crys...," he turned to Crystal. "Make sure that the little guy knows what he's getting into. I'm sort of using him as bait. He might feel pretty drained after this..." Crystal sat down and whispered to the Pokemon for a moment. The Joltik nodded happily. "He gets it... But I don't. What's your plan?" "We're going to hook this little fella up to the generators, and once something starts sapping his power, Teekay is going to port us down. That way we'll catch him in the act!" Ace explained. "You do know Teleport, don't you buddy?" "Abra...," Teekay said dryly. Ace didn't need Crystal to translate that to "Are Jigglypuff pink?". "Good!" he turned to to the little volunteer. "You ready Joltik?" "Joltik!" the Pokemon squeaked brightly. The small spider Pokemon hopped into the chamber normally reserved for Voltorb, and charged the chamber as high as it would go. The lights came on, and began to dim. Teekay teleported Ace and Crystal to the basement. Three sinister figures watched from the hill above the lab. Well... one sinister figure, and two that could charitably be described as "goon shaped." The two lackeys were scoping out Twilight's Pokemon Lab meticulously, as they were ordered to report when the lights came back on. Something penetrated the first henchman's thick skull, and he managed to ask a question. "How come the Light's keep comin' on and then goin' off again, eh?" asked the skinnier of the two. "Aren't we supposed to go in when they come on?" "Would you be quiet?!" shouted the stouter of the two. "This is all part of our great Admin's plan!... Uh... What is our plan, great Admin?" The blue unicorn let out a heavy exasperated sigh. "Must the Admin explain everything to her lowly Peons? Once they find the little Spark Plug, they'll bring him straight to Professor Sparkle. Once I have my hands on Twilight Sparkle, I will extract the information the Boss needs from her. I. E. the location of experiment #150. Once we have found the errant Experiment..." She let out an evil smile. "We'll be able to further the Boss's plan." "Right!" said the Stout one. "And then we'll take over the world!" "Ahaha...." The skinny one let out a dumb laugh. "And we're gonna get somethin' real good afterwards, right?" "Of course, Snails," said the Admin condescendingly. "You and Snips get to share a pleasure that will be had by many others... "Serving Team Chaos," she smiled. "And the Great and Powerful TRRRRIXIE!" The two foals were not expecting to see what they saw when they came down to the basement. What looked like a furry yellow egg with arms and legs was sitting in front of the fuse box. Two wires were tied to the outlet-prong like horns on the top of its head. It was pumping current into itself, and it seemed to enjoy it rather a lot. It had black markings that wrapped around it's waist. It had yet to notice the team. "Is that...," said Crystal quietly. "An Elekid?" Ace nodded. That's what it was alright. Elekid were rare to say the least. Usually you could only get one via breeding. But here one was large as life and obviously wild. He thought he saw something blinking on his back... But that would have to come later. The two colts stepped out of the shadows. "Alright, the jig is up," Ace said firmly. The Elekid whipped around and saw them. He panicked and tried to make a break for it. He was immediately blocked by Teekay, who stared straight at him, arms crossed and tapping his foot. The Elekid slumped over and slowly turned to Ace. He held out his wrists as if waiting to be cuffed. "Elekid...," he said somberly. Crystal fixed the fuse box, and Ace knelt down to the Pokemon. "Okay buddy," he said quietly. "We have to take you to the Prof. It'll be alright. She's a really nice mare. "Oh my gosh...," the Professor said quickly. She always got overexcited when there was something new to study. "A wild Elekid. Such a rare specimen! I don't even know where to begin..." "Kid...," grumbled the Pokemon, sitting cross-armed on the desk. "Elekid..." "He was gorging himself on energy," said Crystal. "He was binge eating our electricity. Why?" She urged Teekay to go and talk to the Elekid. They seemed to have a heated conversation. Then Teekay turned back to his trainer and stared at her intensely. "Oh...," she said, obviously receiving telepathic information from her Abra. "Oh that's terrible! You poor thing!" She went to hug Elekid. This startled the Pokemon, and caused him to send an electric shock through Crystal. She ended up on the floor, slightly charred. "Hey!" said Ace, amused and upset by this at the same time. "As funny as that was, you do not shock her unless I say it's okay. Get it?" The Elekid looked up at Ace, looked down in shame and slowly nodded. Taking in a sharp sniff. "Don't you dare yell at him!" Crystal said, suddenly upright and still smoking. "He's been through a lot!" "Alright! Alright!" Ace said defensively. "What exactly has the little guy been through?" "Apparently...," Crystal began. "He was hit on the back of the head and woke up outside of the lab completely drained of energy. He needed the electricity or else he would have died. So he had to stock up on as much as he could so it wouldn't happen again... The poor guy has been separated from his herd for a while now... He's been all on his own." She looked at the Elekid with tears in her eyes. Ace knew that that was the "keep the fuzzy thing warm" instinct kicking in. It was something he liked about her, and something he benefited from in the past. "Let her hug you," Ace smiled at Elekid. "Trust me, it helps." Crystal didn't wait for a response before throwing her arms around the Pokemon. Elekid looked startled, then defeated. Shooting a desperate look at Ace. "Well!" Twilight said. "At least that's over! You're welcome to stay here if you would like Elekid. We have perfect facilities for feeding and caring for Pok-" She was interrupted by the Laboratory doors bursting open. The doorway framed the silhouettes of three unicorns. Two stallions, one stocky, one skinny, and a mare. The Mare stood in the center. "Ahahaha!" she laughed a shrill, over dramatic laughed. "At last the great Trixie's plan has come to perfect fruition! The famed Professor Twilight Sparkle, former Pokemon Geneticist, and storied Pokemon Researcher has been trapped in her lab by such unwilling bait as this feeble Elekid! Surrender! For you cannot hope to face the wrath of Team Chaos, and the Great and Powerful Trixie!" There was a silence in the laboratory, that was finally broken by Red Ace. "Okay...," he said, barely containing his laughter. "Who is the Great and Powerful Trixie, and why is she such a ham?" "A ham?!" Trixie scoffed offended. "Snails! Take care of him! No one insults any performance of mine and lives!" The Skinnier of the two stallions took out a Dusk Ball from his belt. "Skorupi! Get'im!" "Rupiiiiii!" The scorpion Pokemon made straight for Ace. Stinger at the ready. "Not a chance! Come on Teekay!" Crystal shouted at her Abra. "Use Hidden Power!" "Block it, Sneasel!" cried the stocky stallion. The Dark type Pokemon took Teekay's hit full in the face. Psychic attack against Dark type. It didn't leave a scratch. And then something happened that Red Ace can't explain to this day. In a flash of what must have been pure instinct, Ace moved forward and called out "Elekid! Thunderpunch! Give Teekay some room to breathe!" And to his surprise, Elekid obeyed. Leaping forward and nailing the Sneasel in the chest with an electrified fist, knocking it back several feet. Ace stood awestruck, unsure of what had just happened. But he knew one thing, he liked it. He was able to communicate with the Elekid in a way that he hadn't been able to do with a Pokemon before. He looked at Elekid, and smiled. Together they could stop these people from... Actually, what exactly were they doing? He'd have to ask them later... "Alright, Elekid!" Ace smiled. "I've never done this before, but I'm ready if you're with me!" "Kid!" Elekid smiled back. They were ready. On Red Ace's flank appeared the mark of a red diamond surrounding a Master Ball. His destiny was set.