Thread: Are We Heroes?

Wow, this is insanely good.

Thank you very much, Flame Alex, I appreciate the support.

Anyway, thank you to everyone who has taken the time to read this little project of mine, it has finally come to an end - you are about to read the final instalment of Are We Heroes?

Also, it's up for Best Dark Fic in the Awards, so if you could support it - that'd be excellent!

Part 6

Maybe Boss was wrong after all. About Red, I mean. I think if I’m going to lose any battle, it’s probably going to be this one. It’s been hours already and I just feel like giving up. In fact, if Trooper wasn’t here next to me cheering me on, I think I already would have by now.

It’s hot out here too, I’m exhausted. I don’t think Boss would kill me if I surrendered now – he’d probably kill Trooper though and I definitely don’t want that on my conscience. I really don’t know if I can win though and he’ll definitely kill me if I fight until I lose. I’ve lost so many Pokémon, more than he even has with him in fact. I only have a few left now. It’s amazing how powerful Legendaries are, even against Pokémon trained by Trooper and commanded by me, they still seem to have the upper hand.

‘Rock Slide,’ I command and wipe the smile off of Boss’ face.

Against all the odds, my Steelix takes out his Moltres. Boss grumbles something and hesitates as he mulls over which Pokémon to send out next. He’s too scared to send out Entei and I’ve already taken out all his other Fire types and Groudon too.

Boss throws out Registeel’s Poké Ball – he really is stupid.

‘Earthquake,’ I order and Registeel is gone.

It’s no wonder he always gets me to do the battling, he really is terrible at it – you’d think he’d have picked up a thing or two. Boss has two Poké Balls left on his belt now, if I concentrated I could figure out what they are. One is Entei. Boss throws down a Poké Ball and Giratina is released. Of course, how could I forget? Giratina – the embodiment of my shame, the Pokémon I used to break my oath of never using a Legendary.

‘Earthquake,’ I instruct, eager to do what damage I can.

‘Outrage,’ retorts Boss.

Silly move. If Steelix survives and Boss has Giratina do the same again, it will be very good for me. My victory will be far from certain but I’ll stand much better odds. Sadly, it doesn’t turn out that way a Steelix is knocked out by a single hit, without even being given the opportunity to execute its intended Earthquake.

‘What’s left?’ I shout back to Trooper as I withdraw Steelix to its Poké Ball.

‘Kingdra, Vespiquen and Houndoom,’ answers Trooper.

Less than I thought. Not good.

‘You want Houndoom, right?’ checks Trooper, readying Houndoom’s Poké Ball.

‘Kingdra,’ I reply.

‘But Kingdra’s the only one that’s weak to Giratina!’ protests Trooper.

‘Just do it!’ I hiss back to her.

Trooper silently tosses me Kingdra’s Poké Ball. I hope I didn’t offend her. There’s no time to worry about that now anyway.

I send out Kingdra and order a Dragonbreath. Boss plays right into my hands by using Outrage again. Of course, it knocks Kingdra out without it having a chance to attack but that was part of the plan.

‘What was the point in that?’ challenges Trooper.

‘Houndoom,’ I demand without explaining.

I don’t have time to answer questions, if Boss figures out what I’m doing, it’s all over. Trooper tosses me Houndoom’s Poké Ball and I throw it out.

‘Mean Look,’ I order, just to be on the safe side.

‘Outrage!’ commands Boss, naively encouraged by the attack’s previous success.

The look on Boss’ face is priceless, it’s obvious that he doesn’t know how the Outrage technique works – it’s incredible power is compensated for by reducing the power of subsequent attacks. The only reason it worked so well against Kingdra was because it had a type disadvantage. Outrage barely did a scratch to Houndoom.

‘Crunch,’ I announce with an air of superiority.

Boss, in a desperate panic to use a different move, commands a Shadow Claw. This move does even less damage as Houndoom is resistant to it. Houndoom’s Crunch, however, serves to halve Giratina’s health.

‘Wh-what?’ stammers Boss in disbelief, ‘What happened?’

No mercy. Boss is the one that taught me that. Now to abuse his inferior knowledge.

‘Mean Look minimises your attack,’ I lie, then I turn to Houndoom, ‘Crunch.’

Boss is too flustered to even order an attack and Houndoom finishes off Giratina.

He’s really starting to lose his cool now, he almost drops Entei’s Poké Ball before successfully sending it out. I can’t relax though, one more wrong move and we’re through.

‘Mean Look,’ I order.

Houndoom looks confused for a second but soon obeys. Boss begins to sweat. Using Mean Look when your opponent only has one Pokémon left is usually useless but in this case I was using it for psychological reasons.

‘Roar,’ commands Boss.

Entei lets out a deafening roar and Houndoom flees, refusing to battle. I retreat it to its Poké Ball and send out Vespiquen instead.

‘Fire Blast,’ orders Boss.

Predictably, Vespiquen is knocked out in a single move. Hopefully Boss won’t figure out I was lying. I send Houndoom out again, it seems to have gotten some of its courage back.

‘Crunch,’ I instruct.

I really hope Boss fell for it.

‘Smoke Screen,’ he retorts, confirming that he has indeed fallen my trick.

The reason Boss ordered a Smoke Screen instead of an offensive move is because he believes that Mean Look really did reduce Giratina’s attack and therefore that it reduced Entei’s attack too. He thinks that Entei’s attack is so low that it would lose if the two of them went head to head fairly. He thinks that reducing Houndoom’s accuracy so only Entei’s attacks will land accurately is the only way he will win, but he’s wrong, it’s the only way he’ll lose.

Houndoom darts forwards and clamps its teeth on Entei’s torso, then is immediately doused in black smoke billowing from its opponent’s mouth.

Even though my plan has worked, it’s still really risky. If Houndoom’s attacks are on target, I’ll win. If they’re not, I’ll lose. Still, it’s my only hope, Entei is too powerful for Houndoom to take it on in a fair fight.

Boss orders another Smoke Screen and I order another Crunch.

A miss. Damn. Same again.

This one’s on target. Just one more should do it.

The same routine again and this time Houndoom misses again. It’d better hit soon because each Smoke Screen makes it less likely to hit and after six, when maximum inaccuracy is achieved, Boss is sure to have Entei attack. After taking two attacks from Giratina, I doubt Houndoom could withstand even one full power onslaught from Entei.

Smoke Screen number five and Houndoom misses again.

It’s now or never. I order another Crunch and Boss orders another Smoke Screen. Entei spits out so much smoke that I can’t see what’s going on. Houndoom absolutely has to hit this one on target, if it doesn’t, Entei will knock it out and me and Trooper will be as good as dead. There’ll be a new Brains and a new Trooper, maybe there’ll even be a new Net.

I hear Houndoom dash towards Entei and close its jaws.

I don’t hear a yelp of pain or Entei falling to the ground. Houndoom missed again. This tactic was a mistake – it’s all over. I tremble and tears well up in my eyes, I think I’m going to fall over. I can’t believe we’ve failed.

‘Smoke Screen!’ I hear Boss yell.

Boss’ lack of knowledge provides one final ray of hope.

‘Crunch!’ I scream desperately.

The smoke is already starting to clear because we are moving through the air. Houndoom sinks its jaws into Entei and the Legendary beast falls.

I can see Boss fairly well now.

‘Finish it off,’ growls Boss to Weavile, pointing out Houndoom to it.

Weavile refuses to move from behind Boss – he’s turned it into a coward, it’ll only fight humans now.

Trooper and I approach Houndoom. Houndoom growls at Weavile, who backs away further.

‘I think we can come to some sort of agreement here,’ says Boss desperately while backing from us.

I don’t know what to say to that.

Trooper takes a step forwards and then gestures to Houndoom. Houndoom dashes forwards and knocks Boss off of the edge of the airship. Weavile looks to us nervously, Houndoom advances and Weavile voluntarily jumps off of the edge. It’s so afraid of battling that it’d rather take its chances with a forty thousand foot* fall – what a pitiful excuse for a Pokémon.

It’s all over. I can’t believe it’s finally all over.

***

It’s been over a year since Boss died and I’m back at the Battle Frontier with my dad.

Sometimes I do the Frontier Brain battles instead of him. He’s even officially named me as his successor and has said that he thinks he might retire soon, mainly since he thinks I’m better than him.

I don’t want him to retire though. I used to because I wanted to take over but I don’t anymore. It’s scary being a Frontier Brain nowadays, it seems that they spend more time kicking criminals out of the Battle Frontier than they do actually accepting challenges. Lucy says I have the skill to be a Brain but I don’t have the temperament. I think she’s probably right.

I’m just sitting in my room in the residential area of the Battle Factory at the moment. The phone in my room rings so I go over and answer it.

‘Yes?’ I answer.

I’m a man of few words these days. My dad says I’ve got to be friendlier if I want to be a Brain.

‘There’s someone here to see you, Master Julian,’ says someone at the other end of the phone.

I think it’s a receptionist or someone speaking.

‘Who is it?’ I ask.

‘She says to tell you it’s ‘Trooper’,’ comes the reply.

No way.

‘Send her right up!’ I yell excitedly.

I can’t believe Trooper’s here! I haven’t seen her in ages! In fact, I’ve only seen her once since Boss died. Whenever I talk about it, I always say ‘Boss died’, I can never bring myself to say we killed him.

There’s a knock on the door of my room.

‘Come in!’ I shout eagerly.

Trooper opens the door with a smile on her face.

‘Nice pad you’ve got,’ she says.

She’s never been to the Battle Factory before.

‘Good to see you!’ I greet her, ‘What brings you all the way here?’

‘I noticed that there’s a lot of security here,’ remarks Trooper, side stepping my question, ‘Has it always been like that?’

‘No,’ I answer honestly but shamefully, ‘Only in the last month or so.’

‘It’s the same in Sinnoh,’ she says, ‘There’s been a lot of crime in the last couple of months and I mean a lot.’

We sit in silence for a second. We’re both thinking about Boss.

‘Maybe he wasn’t that bad,’ she suddenly pipes up, breaking the silence.

‘Don’t say that,’ I snap.

‘Seriously,’ insists Trooper, ‘He may have been ruthless and he may have killed innocent people now and again but he was really effective at keeping the world safe from criminals.’

‘He was a criminal himself,’ I retort, ‘He killed people, Trooper. You can’t just sweep that under the rug. What about Net?’

There’s silence again.

‘You’re right,’ replies Trooper, half stating, half asking, ‘We did the right thing.’

‘Yes,’ I confirm, more for my own benefit than for hers, ‘We did.’

Do I believe that just because it’s convenient for me to believe that though? Was the world a better place when Boss was at large? Was killing him the right thing to do? Are we heroes?


*40,000 ft is just over 12km.

A nice conclusion. That's basically all I have to say. You wrapped up the short story pretty well, although it seemed more like an ending that would have been used in a long story like mine.

Nice ending! Glad boss finally died that dick ^_^

[thumbs up] Pleased to bring you shame, Brains. :D

...Seriously now, good job on this! I'm assuming that Brains is the son of Noland; Thorton is maybe sixteen years old, and since this seems to happen somewhere near present day I don't think he'd have a family quite yet. ...Oh, wait, there's a mention of Lucy. Yep, he's Noland's son.

Regardless - congratulations on bringing this awesome fic to a satisfying close! =3

I praise you, Mama, on your excellent choice in characters. Noland's son would be proficient at dealing with all different types of pokemon, since that is in fact the goal of the Battle Factory. Wish I had thought of that while I was reading.

This was a brilliant conclusion. I thought that the title of the series was odd at first, but it's use as the last line was really fantastic :D Can't wait for your next masterpiece

Gastly I have to say - you didn't disappoint once again. Your writing skills and character development in Are We Heroes? are superb. I actually was scared for Brains (or should I say Julian) and Trooper in the end. I seriously hated Boss. Anyway again awesome writing. This was certainly a spectacular tale. You've done it again!

Originally Posted by Giratina!

[thumbs up] Pleased to bring you shame, Brains. :D

...Seriously now, good job on this! I'm assuming that Brains is the son of Noland; Thorton is maybe sixteen years old, and since this seems to happen somewhere near present day I don't think he'd have a family quite yet. ...Oh, wait, there's a mention of Lucy. Yep, he's Noland's son.

Regardless - congratulations on bringing this awesome fic to a satisfying close! =3

Thank you very very much! And, yes, you are totally right, Brains is the son of Noland.

Originally Posted by AceTrainer14

This was a brilliant conclusion. I thought that the title of the series was odd at first, but it's use as the last line was really fantastic :D Can't wait for your next masterpiece

Thank you so much for referring to this as a masterpiece!

Originally Posted by Wheels

Gastly I have to say - you didn't disappoint once again. Your writing skills and character development in Are We Heroes? are superb. I actually was scared for Brains (or should I say Julian) and Trooper in the end. I seriously hated Boss. Anyway again awesome writing. This was certainly a spectacular tale. You've done it again!

For the record, Brains' surname is Julian rather than his first name but whatever. Anyway, thank you very much, Wheels, I'm glad to have had you so invested in the characters!

As you can hopefully see, this fic has now been moved to the Completed Fics Archive. Just pointing it out.

It made it to the vary few fics in the writers Archeive. A Greayt way to conclude a great fic.

Great ending. If anyone deserved a death, it was Boss.

As usual, a fantastic fanfic courtesy of Gastly's Mama. Although it was only six chapters, you managed to fit in so much. Brilliant!

I read over 30 books or so every month, and I enjoyed this more than all most every teen fiction(ugh) I have ever read. You can hold more than a candle to Orson Scott Card, Timothy Zahn, Arron Allston, Clive Clussler, etc. BRA-VO!!!

I know it's a little late to post here, but I gotta say...
This fic was awesome! I could actually feel the characters excitement, You made it very realistic too, by bringing in the FEAR strategy and baton passing to Snorlax. I was able to make an actual team like that (Umreon FTW!) and it did great on Shoddy. Anyhow, this was truly an amazing story.

I joined this site to look for awesome fanfics and i got what i wanted right here :O very well done